Richard Brake is a Welsh

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

/American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 actor

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

.

Early life

Brake was born in Ystrad Mynach

Ystrad Mynach

Ystrad Mynach is a town in the County Borough of Caerphilly, previously within the ancient traditional county of Glamorgan, Wales, and is 5 miles north of Caerphilly town. It has a population of around 13,500 and stands in the Rhymney Valley . Before the Industrial Revolution and the coming of coal...

, Hengoed

Hengoed

Hengoed ) is a village on the west side of the Rhymney Valley - between Ystrad Mynach to the South and Cefn Hengoed to the North. Across the valley it looks towards Maesycwmmer...

, Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

 and brought up in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 (North Carolina

North Carolina

North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...

, Connecticut

Connecticut

Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...

, Georgia

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

, Tennessee

Tennessee

Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...

 and Ohio

Ohio

Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

). He attended Western Reserve Academy

Western Reserve Academy

Western Reserve Academy is a private, mid-sized, coeducational boarding and day college preparatory school located in Hudson, Ohio.-History:...

 in Hudson, Ohio

Hudson, Ohio

Hudson is a city in Summit County, Ohio, United States. The population was 22,262 at the 2010 census. It is an affluent exurban community and is part of the Akron, Ohio Metropolitan Statistical Area...

.

Acting career

Having appeared in numerous productions (including brief appearances in Cold Mountain

Cold Mountain (film)

Cold Mountain is a 2003 war drama film written and directed by Anthony Minghella. The film is based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Charles Frazier...

and Munich

Munich (film)

Munich is a 2005 historical fiction film about the Israeli government's secret retaliation attacks after the massacre of Israeli athletes by the Black September terrorist group during the 1972 Summer Olympics. The film stars Eric Bana and was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg...

), Brake achieved his first significant role in mainstream cinema being cast as Joe Chill

Joe Chill

Joe Chill is a fictional character in the DC Comics Batman series. He is best known for murdering young Bruce Wayne's parents , thus making him indirectly responsible for Batman's existence....

 in Christopher Nolan

Christopher Nolan

Christopher Jonathan James Nolan is a British-American film director, screenwriter and producer.He received serious notice after his second feature Memento , which he wrote and directed based on a story idea by his brother, Jonathan Nolan. Jonathan went to co-write later scripts with him,...

's 2005 film

2005 in film

- Highest-grossing films :Please note that following the tradition of the English-language film industry, these are the top-grossing films that were first released in the United States in 2005...

, Batman Begins

Batman Begins

Batman Begins is a 2005 American superhero action film based on the fictional DC Comics character Batman, directed by Christopher Nolan. It stars Christian Bale as Batman, along with Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes, Cillian Murphy, Morgan Freeman, Ken Watanabe, Tom Wilkinson,...

. In this film (as in most versions of the Batman comic series), his character Chill was the criminal who murdered the Batman's parents, effectively starting him on his path to caped justice.

Following this, Brake appeared as the warped Portman in Doom

Doom (film)

Doom is a 2005 science fiction horror film, loosely based on the Doom series of video games created by id Software. It was directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak....

, with Karl Urban

Karl Urban

Karl-Heinz Urban is a New Zealand actor.He is known for playing Éomer in the second and third installments of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy in the 2009 film Star Trek and Julius Caesar on Xena: Warrior Princess...

 and The Rock. Brake also made a cameo appearance in the video for Muse

Muse (band)

Muse are an English alternative rock band from Teignmouth, Devon, formed in 1994. The band consists of school friends Matthew Bellamy , Christopher Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard...

's Knights of Cydonia

Knights of Cydonia

"Knights of Cydonia" is a song by English alternative rock band Muse and is the closing track on the British release of their 2006 album Black Holes and Revelations. The song's title comes in part from the region of Mars named Cydonia, famous for the "face on mars"...

, playing a villainous Sheriff in a strange futuristic western. He then played the villain Bobby De Witt in The Black Dahlia

The Black Dahlia (film)

The Black Dahlia is a 2006 neo noir crime film directed by Brian De Palma. It is based on the novel of the same name by James Ellroy, writer of L.A. Confidential and starred Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart and Hilary Swank. The story is based on the murder of Elizabeth Short...

, and appears in 2007's

2007 in film

This is a list of major films released in 2007.-Top grossing films:Please note that following the tradition of the English-language film industry, these are the top grossing films that were first released in the USA in 2007...

 Hannibal Lecter

Hannibal Lecter

Hannibal Lecter M.D. is a fictional character in a series of horror novels by Thomas Harris and in the films adapted from them.Lecter was introduced in the 1981 thriller novel Red Dragon as a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic serial killer...

 prequel, Hannibal Rising

Hannibal Rising

Hannibal Rising is a novel written by Thomas Harris, published in 2006. It is a prequel to his three previous books featuring his character, the cannibalistic serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter. The novel was released with an initial printing of at least 1.5 million copies and met with a mixed...

as the war criminal Dortlich.

In September 2007, Brake featured on stage at the Young Vic in The Member of the Wedding

The Member of the Wedding

The Member of the Wedding is a 1946 novel by Southern writer Carson McCullers. It took McCullers five years to complete—though she interrupted the work for a few months to write the short novel The Ballad of the Sad Cafe....

by Carson McCullers

Carson McCullers

Carson McCullers was an American writer. She wrote novels, short stories, and two plays, as well as essays and some poetry. Her first novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter explores the spiritual isolation of misfits and outcasts of the South...

. The production was directed by Matthew Dunster.

Returning to film, his next starring role was that of Prior in Outpost from director Steve Barker

Steve Barker

Steve Barker is an English film director and screenwriter. He wrote and directed the short-film Magic Hour starring John Simm. In 2007 he made his directorial feature film debut Outpost, starring Ray Stevenson and Richard Brake....

. He can currently be seen in Craig Singer's After Dark Horrorfest 3 film, Perkins 14. In 2009, Brake appeared as Gary Scott in Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie is an American musician, film director, screenwriter and film producer. He founded the heavy metal band White Zombie and has been nominated three times as a solo artist for the Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.Zombie has also established a career as a film director, creating the...

's Halloween II

Halloween II (2009 film)

Halloween II is a 2009 American horror film written, directed, and produced by Rob Zombie. The film is a sequel to Zombie's 2007 remake of Halloween , and the second film in the rebooted Halloween film series and the tenth Halloween film in total...

, a sequel to his remake of Halloween

Halloween (2007 film)

Halloween is a 2007 American slasher film written, directed, and produced by Rob Zombie. The film is a remake/reimagining of the 1978 horror film of the same name, the first in the rebooted Halloween film series and the ninth Halloween film in total. The film stars Tyler Mane as the adult Michael...

 - a role he garnered based on a personal recommendation to Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie is an American musician, film director, screenwriter and film producer. He founded the heavy metal band White Zombie and has been nominated three times as a solo artist for the Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.Zombie has also established a career as a film director, creating the...

 from Sid Haig

Sid Haig

Sid Haig is a American actor. His roles have included acting in Jack Hill's blaxploitation films of the 1970s as well as his role as Captain Spaulding in Rob Zombie's horror films House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects...

.

He has also appeared in several UK television shows including M.I. High, Keen Eddie

Keen Eddie

Keen Eddie is an American action, comedy-drama television series that aired in 2003 on the Fox Network. The series follows a brash NYPD detective who goes to London when one of his cases goes sour and remains to work with New Scotland Yard...

and Jeeves and Wooster

Jeeves and Wooster

-External links:*—An episode guide to the series, including information about which episodes were adapted from which Wodehouse stories.*—Episode guides, screenshots and quotes from the four series....

, as well as the US television show Cold Case.

Currently, he is filming Legacy in Scotland for Black Camel Pictures

Black Camel Pictures

Black Camel Pictures is a production company based in Glasgow. Founded by Arabella Croft and Kieran Parker with Steve Barker and Michael Callaghan working with them. They mortgaged their £200,000 home in Glasgow to finance production for their first movie Outpost...

, the producers of Outpost

Outpost (film)

-Plot:In a seedy bar in a town ravaged by war, scientist and businessman Hunt hires mercenary and former Royal Marine D.C. to assemble a crack team of ex-soldiers to protect him on a dangerous journey into no-man's land...

.

External links